Sisco Visit

Vickie and Rob visited for a few days this week and weekend. Manitou Springs and Old Colorado City was our theater of operation.

Thursday:

Holden House. Highly recommended.

Pikes Peak Cog Railway all the way to 14,110 feet. All Thursday photos.

Manitou Springs. Fun downtown, some good eats.

Friday:

Seven Falls, by the Broadmoor. All Friday photos.

Seven Falls.

The Golden Bee, at the Broadmoor. Jamie was here a
couple times back in space authority days.

Saturday:

Cheyenne Mountain Zoo. All Saturday photos.

Matteo and AJ had swim team practice at the
U.S. Olympic Training Center in Colorado Springs.

FUMCAG: Thank You!

Our Methodist church family gave us a send off on our way to Colorado, and included a gift certificate to a restaurant in Colorado Springs, Paravicini's Italian Bistro in Old Colorado City. Lynn and I got to use that gift on our way to meeting up there with Vickie and Rob for our "Manitou Springs Get-Away" for a few days. See other recent post on those wonderful days. Below are a couple pics from our Paravicini's experience, which was great.

Reminded us of a favorite we discovered through Foremost Wine Company
in San Luis Obispo, Renato Ratti Barbera d'Alba.

Important for No Good Reason

Some things that make a house into a home are inexplicable. Certainly no inherent value. Just an odd little thing that ends up accumulating importance. This picture and frame have been in Nana's and Papa's bathroom since their first apartment in Northfield, MN in 1975. That's like 12 homes ago. I have no recollection of where or why we got it. It just seems to scream "us," I guess.

Western Museum of Mining and Industry

And when they say, "the museum that works," they mean it. Most of the equipment displayed actually works! And they demonstrated a few for us. Now they may not be steam driven as originally done, but with the magic of compressed air and/or electrical "supply," they ran. And this place is just down the road from us, about 2 miles. Western Museum of Mining and Industry website. We saw the first snow on Pikes Peak this morning, too, and celebrated with Daou, one of our favorite "mountain top" wines from California. All the photos are here.

This was one of six(ish) miner escape capsules
made to successfully rescue the 33 miners in Chile.

The machine gears are blurry because it's running.

Today's treasures.

Till Kitchen

This was a fun find just down the road. Till Kitchen. You can read all about it on the website. Suffice it to say we had a fabulously fun meal. From service to food to environment. Discovered a new wine, too, but it's from CA - Santa Ynez Valley if you can believe that - The Paring (can be tasted at the Santa Barbara Wine Collective on Anacapa). We shared that steak and still brought about a pound home.

By Way of Bees. Rum, Prosecco, and
Colorado honey. Lynn's new fave.

Tomahawk steak, smokey mashed potatoes,
and some unbelievable grits.

That's The Paring's 2013 Syrah.

Candy flight. Truffles from white to dark. Even the little flakey
black things and greens were yummy.

Fall is here

And it's starting to look like it in the new house...

Rube Goldberg and Mars Rovers

Nana, Papa, Matteo, and AJ ventured to the Space Foundation's Discovery Center this morning. They were having a special "Build a Rube Goldberg Machine" workshop for kids of all ages. So what the heck... And, bonus, they had Lego Mars rovers to drive remotely across their mock-up Mars terrain.